Tony Award nominee Mueller (Mystery of Edwin Drood, On a Clear Day, Nice Work If You Can Get It) will star as King. Set to appear as her Brill Building collaborators are Epstein ("Degrassi," Spider-Man) as Gerry Goffin, Larsen (Xanadu, Avenue Q) as Cynthia Weil and Spector (Jersey Boys) as Barry Mann. The musical's score comprises songs King penned with Goffin, Mann and Weil.
Principal casting also includes Jeb Brown as producer/publisher Don Kirshner and Liz Larsen as King's mother, Genie Klein.
The ensemble will feature Ashley Blanchet, E. Clayton Cornelious, Joshua Davis, Alysha Deslorieux, Kevin Duda, Carly Hughes, Sara King, Rebecca LaChance, Douglas Lyons, Chris Peluso, Gabrielle Reid, Arbender Robinson, Rashidra Scott, Sara Shepard, Antoine L. Smith and Melvin Tunstall.
Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, based on King's life and music, will premiere Sept. 24-Oct. 20 at San Francisco's Curran Theatre and will now begin Broadway previews Nov. 21 at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre towards a Jan. 12, 2014, opening night.
The complete creative team includes Derek McLane (set design), Alejo Vietti (costume design), Peter Kaczorowski (lighting design), Brian Ronan (sound design), Charles G. LaPointe (wig and hair design), Steve Sidwell (orchestrations and music arrangements), Jason Howland (music supervision) and John Miller (music coordination). Paul Blake and Sony/ATV Music Publishing are producing the musical that features a book by Academy Award nominee Douglas McGrath, who collaborated with Woody Allen on the screenplay for "Bullets Over Broadway." He also penned "Infamous" and "Emma."
Marc Bruni (Pipe Dream, Ordinary Days, Old Jews Telling Jokes) will stage the production that will have choreography by Josh Prince and musical direction by Jason Howland.
"What's so great about this for me is that musicals were a major influence on my songwriting. In fact, when Gerry and I first met, we made a bargain that I would write music for the Broadway show he wanted to write if he wrote lyrics for my rock 'n roll songs. The songs took off, and the show idea never came to fruition. Now that our songs have merged with a Broadway show, we've come full circle," King said in a previous statement.
Here's how the creators bill the musical: "Long before she was Carole King, chart-topping music legend, she was Carol Klein, Brooklyn girl with passion and chutzpah. She fought her way into the record business as a teenager and, by the time she reached her twenties, had the husband of her dreams and a flourishing career writing hits for the biggest acts in rock 'n' roll. But it wasn't until her personal life began to crack that she finally managed to find her true voice. Beautiful tells the inspiring true story of King's remarkable rise to stardom, from being part of a hit songwriting team with her husband Gerry Goffin, to her relationship with fellow writers and best friends Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann, to becoming one of the most successful solo acts in popular music history. Along the way, she made more than beautiful music, she wrote the soundtrack to a generation."
Tickets for the San Francisco engagement go on sale Aug. 16. A pre-sale for the Broadway production begins Aug. 26 for Citi Cardmembers.
Visit beautifulonbroadway.com.
